Paddy Ashdown

Jeremy John Durham "Paddy" Ashdown (27 February 1941-) was the leader of the UK Liberal Democrats from 16 July 1988 to 11 August 1999, succeeding David Steel and preceding Charles Kennedy.

Biography
Jeremy John Durham Ashdown was born in New Delhi, British Raj on 27 February 1941. Ashdown grew up in Northern Ireland, acquiring an accent that earned him the nickname "PAddy" when he went to Bedford School in England. He served in the Royal Marines from 1959 to 1971 and served as a British diplomat at the United Nations until 1976, when he returned to the United Kingdom to work in industry. Ashdown embarked on a political career as a UK Liberal Party member, and he was elected to Parliament in 1983. Ashdown made his name as a radical through his support for unilateral disarmament, but he later changed his position. He became the leader of the newly-formed UK Liberal Democrats in 1988, and he gradually managed to overcome the party's strong internal  divisions through establishing a firm personal following among both the party faithful and the general electorate. Ashdown supported British efforts to pacify wartorn Bosnia and Herzegovina, and he advocated tacit cooperation with Tony Blair's UK LAbor Party to end more than fifteen years of UK Conservative Party rule under Margaret Thatcher and John Major. He left Parliament in 2001 and served as High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina from 2002 to 2006. Ashdown was also made a Lord Temporal of the House of Lords upon leaving Parliament.